Copyright troll Righthaven sues for control of Drudge Report domain

Righthaven, the company that is making a business out of filing copyright …

News aggregation impresario Matt Drudge is being sued for copyright infringement for reproducing a copyrighted photo along with a link to a story about airport security on the Las Vegas Review-Journal website.

The plaintiff in the case is Righthaven, a company that's earned a reputation this year as a world-class copyright troll. Righthaven has sued nearly 200 parties this year alone. Righthaven has typically gone after those who post news excerpts of its partners, such as the Las Vegas Review-Journal, but pledged to be more discretionary after being handed a defeat in court by a judge who recently ruled that one of its targets had "fair use" to its work.

Instead, Righthaven announced it had teamed up with the nation's second-biggest news chain, owners of the Denver Post among others, and has now filed a lawsuit that arguably takes the mass-suer to a whole new level with its biggest target yet.

In the new lawsuit, Righthaven asks a judge to "lock the Drudge Report Domain and transfer control of the Drudge Report Domain to Righthaven."

Why?

According to the complaint filed yesterday in Nevada District Court, the Drudge Report website is alleged to have posted a photo first found in the Denver Post showing a TSA agent giving a pat-down at an airport.

Drudge has been sued before for committing libel via his provocative linking. In 1997, former Clinton White House aide Sidney Blumenthal sued Drudge for defamation, a case that was later settled on favorable terms to Drudge four years later. The topic of linking liability in the defamation context is also being examined this week at Canada's Supreme Court.

This lawsuit, though, is a rarity insofar as copyright infringement being connected to linking. Righthaven takes issue with the fact that the Drudge Report has no DMCA takedown regime to respond to those who alleged violations of copyright.

The plaintiff demands statutory damages for willful infringement, costs, and an injunction that would allow Righthaven to seize the Drudge Report domain.

It's not the ignorant and counterproductive disregard of fair use that astonishes me (don't you dare link to our site and drive traffic here you criminals!), it's the ridiculous call to have domains turned over that is mind boggling. The Drudge Report, arguably more important than a dying Las Vegas paper, should just hand over it's site? It's incomprehensible. These lawyers should be disbarred for wasting everyone's time.

I never understood the whole transfer of the domain part. Where does this even come into play?

In another spin, think of it like this:RIAA: Hey, that block party played songs without our permission, so we're going to take your house. Not sue you so much that you have to sell it, just totally get the deed transfered to us.

Am I seeing this wrong? I'd love some perspective into this if anyone has some.

I may seem like a rube but can someone explain if Righthaven even has a right to take over their domain name? To my layperson mind it translates to "They used our photograph without our permission, now we demand their business". But doesn't this really mean that Righthaven would simply get drudgereport.com? Can't Matt Drudge simply put all of his content up on a new domain like "thedrudge.com". Maybe Righthaven's luck has soured recently because they are trying to throw the kitchen sink at every offense big and small. I always had a feeling judges tend to look down on outrages and irrational claims.

Well, Righthaven has done it now. They've pissed off the Teahadis. Now they're really screwed. The entire RWNM is going to descend on them with the fury of a thousand overweight middle-aged angry white men whinging about their taxes from the comfort of their Medicare scooters. Drudge's Fair Use rights couldn't be clearer here. It won't even be a contest.

I think Drudge now needs to sue you for using his flashing beacons. Moreover, you have opened yourself to being sued by Righthaven as well for linking that photo and for including a quote by someone from Righthaven.

I never understood the whole transfer of the domain part. Where does this even come into play?

I'm not entirely sure as to the logic* behind it, but near as I can figure out, Righthaven is trying to steal the readership of these other sites to prop up the dying corpus of a print journal that it's white-knighting for.

Personally, I'd like to see Righthaven's suit dismissed due to 'lack of grounds to sue', as, being a different corporate entity than the paper, Righthaven has technically not been infringed against.

The drudgereport is great, and so is this lawsuit!!! Like someone pointed out above, you chose an entity that has the means to defend itself which will undoubtably be a learning mistake for Righthaven.

I am thinking Righthaven has some pretty cocky lawyers that probably made the claim that going after Drudge was a win-win. Either we win the lawsuit or we scare him into a winning settlement. But we all forget that judges hate ridiculous lawsuits and have been known to punish Plaintiffs on occasion (although 99/100 its a simple summary for dismissal).

Here's my (untrained, non-lawyer) prediction: I think Righthaven has a case for copyright infringement on the photo. I'm not positive about that, but I could see that. After all, a photo has a copyright all by itself - it's considered a complete work. Fair use generally allows excerpting a copyrighted work, but not generally copying a work in total. Completely copying all (or most - e.g. I don't think cropping out a small pixel-width border around the photo would be a substantial enough reduction to count as 'excerpting') of photo for commercial use might not pass fair use muster (I'm not sure about in the case of Ars's use of it above - in that case, the photo is the subject of the article/lawsuit, so perhaps at that point it becomes fair use, but ripping off someone else's photo for use as an illustration on your website about a topic the photo depicts really does strike me as infringement).

I don't think any judge is going to seize a domain name for what amounts to maybe a few thousand dollar copyright infringement? The linking thing, I HOPE TO GOD has no merit, and will be dismissed by the court.

So, in the end I predict a small slap on the wrist judgement for the photo against Drudge Report, plus maybe attorneys fees paid to Righthaven's lawyers.

Jeff, i can only hope you are wrong and Righthaven gets a swift boot in the ass.

Drudge just links to articles, he is like againstdumb.com but a lot more sensational. I can see this since the link did not refer to originator. Drudge did violate copyright here. However a take down notice should be issued first, and if ignored, than a suit filed. Righthaven are fuckers (and we can all say that because it is not slander ).

Lawyers are what is wrong with our society. They don't champion the victims, they champion cold hard cash.

I suppose you work for free?

We present options, and then pursue the course of action that the client wants. Yes there are some bad / unethical attorneys, but that are far more ethical lawyers than not.

Wida wrote:

The best solution to this problem would probably be to blow up Righthaven's offices with all the lawyers in it.

Because as we all know, murder solves everything.

On topic:

If Drudge is as smart as he should be, this should be a covered event. And unless he has a consent clause in his policy, his carrier is going to make the ultimate call as to settlement / trial. It's the rare adjuster that cares about precedent. And Righthaven and/or its attorneys know that, so this might not be as fun to watch as I, personally, would hope.